Saturday, October 4, 2008

Belted Kingfisher

We are getting better at kingfisher photos, or he is getting less camera shy. This one was very active fishing today, hitting the water several times with a big splash. Once, it hovered for about 30 seconds flapping its wings like a giant hummingbird.

I have a question. I live & work in NJ as a landscaper. A few days ago I was following up on a job & I ran into a strange prehistoric looking bird. Which turns out to resemble a king fisher 9in. tall 14in long & very husky! Colors were a light brown w/ few dark brown areas. How do i find out what it was? Thanks, Joe from camden co.- JB911TS@aol.com

Contributed Photos

Here are some photos sent in recently.

Hairy Woodpecker and SparrowsI took this photo a month or so ago, the Hairy Woodpecker stopped by to visit for a couple of days and then moved on, we have lived in Butler for several years and never had a Hairy visit before, the Sparrows are regular visitors. Picture by misseymarie : )

From Jeffery, Cherry Hill NJ

From Kathy

From Monica: Osprey seen on Lake Lackawanna October 4, 2008 in my back yard! M

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Osprey at Lake Nelson

Hello, bird lovers! Well, what an evening we had. It was not a sunny day but since it was warm, we said let's just go out in the boat. At first we weren't even going to take the camera since it was a gray day. We got a out a little and we saw a cormorant, so Mike said we have to go back because we don't have any cormorant photos with the new camera. So, off we go again with the camera, binoculars, and an apple, in case we needed something to sustain ourselves. Sure glad we had that camera! What a great treat to see the osprey. Mike spotted it in the tree first; its white head gave it away. We saw it dive for fish a few times, and it really didn't seem bothered by us at all, unlike the Kingfishers who were also around today and still can't stand us. We were really surprised by the little chirpy call this osprey makes. It was cute for such a big bird as opposed to the tiny wren who has such a loud song.

Jersey Birding Links

Birds at the Bird feeders

About us

For those of you visiting this site who do not know us, we thought we would offer a brief explanation of how it all happened. We have lived in several different states, including Connecticut, New Hampshire, California, Virginia, and New Jersey. The house we rented sits right on a small lake, so we initially saw lots of geese and some mallards, rather mundane yet enjoyable. There seemed to also be an abundance of woodpeckers, and we started putting suet out for them. Mike frequently gets up early, and while working from his desk in the window this past fall, he noticed something other than geese on the lake. At first it started with a Pied-billed grebe, and then we also saw briefly a Wood Duck or two, a few Ring-necked ducks, Bufflhead, and then the gorgeous Hooded Mergansers. Well, we’ve fed birds before at other homes, but we’ve never lived on water, and we were especially fascinated by the beauty of the Hooded Mergansers. We have two grown daughters and family sprinkled around the US, and we were constantly e-mailing them pictures of the birds and ducks, so we decided it would just be easier to put them up on the web to share. We are not real die-hard birders, and we have no formal photography training. We’re just a couple who is enjoying the birds and waterfowl of their own backyard and wanted to share them. So, you may find more professional pictures somewhere else, but we hope you enjoy our site as well.

We moved back to California in June 2012, and we've started a new blog, California Birds. Here are our most recent California photos.